RED Driving School to offer lessons for driverless cars

RED Driving School has today announced plans to offer customers lessons for driverless vehicles, following government investment into driverless technology.

Alongside regular driving lessons, pupils who want to use driverless cars can start taking instruction with us from May 1 2015.

We are the first driving school in the country to offer driverless lessons after it was announced by the government that trials for driverless vehicles would take place in Greenwich, Bristol, Milton Keynes and Coventry.

With plans for further driverless expansion nationwide over the next 12 months, we’ve made additional training for driverless vehicles mandatory for all instructors.

CEO of RED Driving School Ian McIntosh said: ‘The investment by the government shows that driverless technology is an inevitable part of our future. As a leading driving school, we are embracing the technology and want to ensure we are offering all of our customers the choice to have lessons for manual, automatic and driverless vehicles.

‘We anticipate huge demand for driverless lessons. For all driverless pupils, we can’t emphasise enough the importance of road safety and it’s imperative that everyone who operates a driverless vehicle takes specialist driving lessons to ensure they fully understand how to operate the new technology.’

Speaking about the skills required to pass the driverless practical test, McIntosh said: ‘The driverless lessons will focus on how to operate the vehicle, new technologies and road safety practice.’

In March, Chancellor George Osborne gave financial backing to driverless technology, pledging to invest £100 million into the industry. The same figure is expected to be matched by businesses, to help fund research and development on the computer and telecoms systems needed to make the cars a reality.

The Chancellor said the money would help the UK’s ‘brilliant automotive industry… to stay ahead in the race to driverless technology’, with Secretary for Business Vince Cable claiming the investment ‘will help to ensure we are world-leaders in this field and able to benefit from what is expected to be a £900 billion industry by 2025.’